Merri, Are You Doing Okay?
by MeredithBrody
Summary: Brody's behaviour has changed drastically since Russo's betrayal, and Pride thinks it's about time that he addresses it. (Post-S2)(proto-Prody)


**I blame this entirely on the fact that I've had "Kristy, Are You Doing Okay?" by The Offspring on for nearly 2 hours. It just fits Merri in so many ways. So, the title is a play on that song title, and the lyrics are from the song too. Enjoy!  
-Shin xx**

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Can you stay strong? Can you go on?  
Kristy, are you doing okay?  
A rose that won't bloom, winter's kept you  
Don't waste your whole life trying  
To get back what was taken away  
"Kristy, Are You Doing Okay?" by The Offspring

Dwayne Pride knew that, to varying degrees, every member of his team was struggling with something right now. Both Chris and Sonja seemed to be dealing with something personal, and they were doing it privately, which meant he didn't feel like he had to step in. Until it interfered professionally, he would leave them alone and let them work out whatever was going on with them.

The woman across the squad room from him, on the other hand, was silently falling apart. They could all see it, but he didn't think any of them knew quite how to address it. He knew that he didn't, but at the same time he was the boss. That meant that it fell to him to try and help her work things out. That wasn't going to be the easiest when it was obvious that she was trying to deny that she was struggling at all.

King knew that Russo had done a number on Merri, and given that she had already been struggling with more issues than he cared to know about, that had clearly pushed her off of the edge. She was jittery and nervous, and she was snapping at everyone about the smallest things. He sent Chris and Sonja out on a recon assignment, hoping that it would give him time to speak with her.

When she got up to go through to the kitchen he followed, hoping that not being in the main room would help her feel less like this was an ambush. Right now he needed to talk to her, and he was pretty sure that she knew it too. He could sense her avoiding him, but he wasn't going to let her avoid this indefinitely. "Merri."

"I'm okay, King." She replied, a beat too quickly, and he was pretty sure that she didn't even convince herself. After another second she turned to him, her still empty mug in her hands. He knew that she wasn't clueless, and that she'd know he was worried about her. They were all worried about her. "I've felt you watching me."

"Try again. It's just the two of us here." He pushed for a moment, knowing that without that she probably wouldn't say anything. As she held her silence he stepped closer to her and picked the mug from her hands, then lifted her chin so she had to look him in the eye. In that tiny movement he saw everything that she couldn't cover up fast enough. "I can see you're not okay."

"You want the truth?" She asked after another few seconds of silence. He wasn't sure why she felt like she needed to ask him that. He always appreciated honesty, especially from her. Merri had not been hired to placate him, she'd been hired to keep him in line, and she'd done an amazing job at that, in reality. Even right now she was good at that.

"Always." He eventually nodded, letting go of her chin, squeezing her shoulder as he dropped his hand. Certain that she'd need another moment being reminded that he was there for her, and even though this was hard, that it was for the best. That she truly needed to talk about this with someone, and he was there to listen, and he was there to help her.

She took a deep, shaky breath, and that concerned King again for a moment. What was she going to tell him that had her this shaken up. "I feel like another part of me was stolen away." It was barely above a whisper, but it was strong enough that he could hear. There was a venom in it that he hadn't expected at all. "I already lost my faith when I lost Emily, my trust when James left." He knew that both those situations had caused some of Merri's ongoing problems, but he didn't yet understand the relevance. "I finally start recovering both… and John came in and reminded me that neither of those things was good for me."

"Merri." He sighed, shaking his head. Of course Russo's betrayal would have reminded her of all of that. She had decided to go out on a limb, to trust someone who she thought was a good guy. For whom all the evidence seemed to support him being a good guy. He was actually the opposite though, and Merri had figured that out, too late to save herself in a sense, but she had still known that something was wrong.

"Don't tell me that I'm wrong, that he was just a bad person." Again there was a bitterness to Merri's words. She was wrong, and he was bad. But clearly that knowledge wasn't helping her move past all of this. Then a sarcastic and slightly broken smile played across Merri's face. King was about to say something when she actually spoke, and it reminded him that she really didn't have the best luck. "I seem to attract them, remember?"

"You have people here who love you, who want to help you." He was, of course, speaking of their team. All of them loved Merri in their own way, and every single one of them wanted to help her, wanted to support her. Just nobody knew what to do, and she'd been so busy pushing them all away that she'd made it even harder for them to work it out.

"I know, and I don't know how to deal with that anymore." Her voice broke, and her hand started to shake. King reached out and covered it with his, though that only seemed to increase her distress for a moment. "What if something happened to one of you?" That question seemed to break what thread of self control Merri had been clinging to, and she just fell forward against him.

Wrapping his arms round her and holding her to his chest he rocked her softly as her body shook with sobs. If she'd been holding all this in he wasn't surprised that she'd been as jumpy as she had been. "I've got you Merri." He whispered quietly into her ear before just resuming rocking her, holding her tightly. Her hands were pressed around his back, holding him just as tightly. "I've got you." He repeated after a few seconds longer. Feeling her start to take some control back, though she quite clearly wasn't letting go of him.

"How do I get past this?" She whispered after a few minutes, still with her face buried in his neck. If that's where she needed to be for the moment he wasn't going to fight her. King just wanted to help her, and this was one way for him to do that. Merri was clearly a little calmer, and that was good.

"You let us carry you when you need to, you tell me when you need someone there." He knew that they were all there for her, including Patton, Sebastian and Loretta too. He took a chance and kissed her temple softly as he pulled back far enough that he could put a hand on her cheek and smile at her. "Russo already took so much from you, don't let him take you from you too."

"I'm not strong enough to do this again." Merri's whispered fear told him more about how she viewed herself than almost anything else she could have said. She was not the easiest of people to get on with, and she was not the easiest person to understand. However, right there he knew that she thought she couldn't pull herself out of another hole. He'd seen her in action. He'd seen her recover from Emily, from the Moultrie, from Baitfish. She was stronger than she let herself believe.

"You've got the strength, you do. I've seen you come through everything that has been thrown at you." He wiped a tear from under her eye and smiled at her again. He had absolute faith in her, and he wasn't going to let her fall, let her feel like she was going to fail. He would tell her every day for the rest of their lives if that was what she needed. "You can do this too, I know you can."

Her voice broke again and her lip wobbled as she spoke. "Why did I let him in?" It was a question he wondered himself, not that he'd ever say it to her, but he couldn't answer it. Right now he doubted that she could answer it either. He also knew that didn't really matter, she wasn't with him any more, and that did matter. To all of them.

"Only you can answer that, but it's not an answer that matters. What matters is that you stopped him." He was going to keep reminding her of that until she accepted all of it. Merri was a master at compartmentalising, and this was something that she needed to face in full. That she needed to know was allowed. "Don't waste your life regretting these things, Meredith. You are so much more than all of them." She had made mistakes, they all had, but she was better than most at repairing her mistakes. "You are an amazing agent, and I'm proud to call you my partner."

"Thank you, for everything." She whispered then buried her head in his neck again. He saw Chris coming to the door, clearly having returned. He just waved a hand a moment and smiled to himself as their friend got his point. King then returned his attention to the woman in his arm. Hoping that this breakdown was the start of her healing. She needed that, and he wanted his friend back. He would do anything he could to help her get there.


End file.
